


MurderHaus

by iamnotmagic_cath



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Canon-Compliant, F/M, M/M, No actual Murder I promise!, So this takes place during Bitty's sophomore year around spring break, sfw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-12
Updated: 2016-04-12
Packaged: 2018-06-01 22:15:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6538570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamnotmagic_cath/pseuds/iamnotmagic_cath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>•	Rules: No killing anyone who is naked <br/>•	No killing in the dining hall, library between the hours of 7 and 9 pm, Faber, or in that person’s bedroom<br/>•	Knives will be delivered at midnight, no murder for 24 hours mandated planning period<br/>•	Once you’ve collected three knives/murders, you may kill anyone (but no more than one unknifed kill per day)<br/>•	Last person standing wins a $25 gift card for Annie’s, a bottle of mid-price range vodka, and a year’s worth of bragging rights</p><p>Let the Murder Games begin!</p>
            </blockquote>





	MurderHaus

**Author's Note:**

> I got this fic idea from this post on tumblr http://alloverthegaf.tumblr.com/post/142219232256/alloverthegaf-its-murder-time-at-college-so which is overall an amazing prompt. Like, I feel every fandom needs this.
> 
> Also, non-beta'd, all mistakes are mine (please comment if you spot any!)

“MURDERHAUS!!!”

Jack groans as he and Bitty walk in with groceries from murder Stop-and-Shop and are greeted with Shitty’s enthusiastic yelling. “I’m confused,” says Bitty, wrinkling his adorably pert nose with confusion, “Jack, what’s Shitty hollerin’ about now?”

Shitty answers Bittle himself as he excitedly runs down the stairs into the hallway and sees the two holding bags full of baking supplies (read: butter), “Bittybro, Murderhaus is literally the most sacred of Samwell Men’s Hockey traditions, even more so than a frog’s first kegstand.”

Shitty’s explanation is interrupted when Ranson and Holster join them in the hallway and high five, “We’re gonna kill everyone this year!”   
“Yeah, Holster, just don’t kill me right off the bat like last time!”   
“Oh come on Rans, I barely even knew you that year, of course I won’t kill you again!”

Ransom and Holster keep chirping each other, and Bitty is still confused until Jack gets his attention by placing a hand on his shoulder and says, “Every year around Spring Break play Murderhaus, wherein we all try to kill each other, except not... not really!” he adds looking at Bittle’s suddenly alarmed face. “Don’t worry, we’ll have a pregame meeting tonight where we’ll go over the rules and stuff.”

“Oh, okay” Bittle, while still bemused, decides to just start putting away food stuffs and resolves to wait for more information, and ignores Shitty as he continues his cries of “MURDERHAUS” in every room.

_X_

“Okay, so here are the rules of MurderHaus…” John Johnson, former metaphysical goalie for the Samwell team (now only metaphysical) stands in front of the diseased green couch and addresses the room at large where several members of the team are gathered.

“Johnson! What are you doing back here? Not that we aren’t excited to see you!” Chowder, Bitty’s beloved frog son looks both overwhelmed and excited (his default expression) to see Johnson at the Haus, though he certainly isn’t the only one confused as their former teammate’s appearance.

“Obviously I’m here because the author needed someone unbiased to oversee the proceedings without having to deal with the fact that only four other teammates are named in the comic and only two of those teammates have faces.” Johnson takes the blank stares in stride and continues, “So, like I was saying, the rules of MurderHaus are thus: No killing anyone who is naked.” Everyone looks at Shitty and groans, while Shitty wears, appropriately, a shit-eating grin (“Hey bros, don’t hate the player, hate the game.”). “Two! Because of certain caveats for the captain, the following areas are out of bounds for murder time: dining hall, library between the hours of 7 and 9 pm, Faber, or in that person’s bedroom. Three, knives with the name of your first victim will be delivered at midnight, but no murder until noon the next day (gotta have time for proper scheming after all). Four, once you’ve collected three knives/murders, you may kill anyone (but no more than one unknifed kill per day). And finally, Last man,” Shitty coughs expectantly “sorry, person standing wins a $25 gift card for Annie’s, a bottle of mid-price range vodka, and a year’s worth of bragging rights. Any questions?”

Bitty raises his hand slightly as he asks, “If this is a yearly tradition, how come y’all didn’t play this last year?”

“Well, quite frankly your freshman year was already full of angst but Jack wasn’t friendly enough to be believably roped into these sorts of shenanigans, so the author is electing to handwave that bit of detail by using a loveable plot device such as myself to explain it all away or at least confuse you so much you don’t ask for clarification.” Johnson looks around at the bemused faces of Jack, Shitty, Lardo, Bitty, Ransom, Holster, and the frogs before bidding them all adieu and stating, again, “The knives will be delivered at midnight. Have fun!” and disappearing from sight and mind.

Slightly confused, but excited due to the spiking adrenaline sparked by the competition the denizens of the Haus shuffled off to other things, eagerly awaiting the start of the game at midnight.

_X_

It’s clear at breakfast the next morning (chocolate chip pancakes made by Bitty, who ignores Jack’s chirps about needing protein and instead forcible shoves one in Jack’s mouth the next time he protests) that certain alliances have already been made. While it was to be expected that Ransom & Holster would continue to be the archetype of (probably) platonic sports bros, no one was quite expecting the subtle but effectively communitive glances between Jack and Lardo. It was roughly two hours before MurderHaus became a slaughter, and to Bitty it seemed as if the bittersweet chips in his pancakes were turning sour from the tension.

_X_ 

At roughly 12:03 p.m. Chowder is the first to die.

Sweet goalie Chowder had tried to run straight to his dorm room after class, all too aware that he would be seen as an easy target. He would have made it to, if not for the cleverly laid trap set by Ransom & Holster. While Chowder had been in class, Holster had carefully nipped over to Faber to “borrow” some practice pucks while Ransom made sure Chowder didn’t leave class early. They had then arranged the pucks across the doors threshold and lay in wait for Chowder’s return, knowing that his puck phobia would prevent him from entering the room. Ransom had then mimed stabbing him with the plastic knife bearing his name. “Good night, sweet prince!” Holster said dramatically, having noticed that Chowder’s shrieks had drawn some attention from the surrounding rooms (“Ugh, it’s always the hockey bros.”). “No hard feelings, guys” mumbles Chowder as he hands Ransom the knife Johnson had given him at midnight. “But, uh, will you…uh…” Chowder gestures uncomfortably towards the door, and Ransom and Holster clear the pucks out of the way so he can get into the room to study, no longer needing to perfect his now useless MurderHaus schemes.

_X_

Holster and Ransom are halfway back to the Haus to begin planning the murder of Holster’s target when the tall blond d-man remembers to ask, “So which person did Chowder have?” Instead of answering, Ransom just murmers a quick, very Canadian sounding, “sorry” before stabbing Holster in the back with the knife they’d won from Chowder. “Sorry man, but paybacks, for last time.” Holster still looks betrayed, and after handing over the knife with his victim’s name on it, spends the rest of the walk back to the Haus on his phone, not even listening while Ransom awkwardly tries to apologize (“C’mon bro, this is just what you did to me!”, “Adam, c’mon bro!”).

_X_

Ransom knew it was coming; he had seen the name of Holster’s knife when the plotted Chowder’s demise (over which Bitty proclaimed he wouldn’t make them a pie for an entire week, while he meticulously made a batch of min-pies for his sweet goalie son). And yet, when Lardo had come gunning for him, instead of him getting the best of her, it had taken him by surprise. But he was more surprised when Holster high-fived Lardo and Ransom realized who his life partner (platonic not yet decided) had been texted on the walk back from Chower’s room. That Holster had been playing The Rains of Castamere on his phone when Lardo pretended to slice his gullet was extra salt in the wound.

“Bro, not cool.”

“You stabbed me first, Justin. You would have seen this coming if you had kept watching Game of Thrones with me.”

Lardo counts her knives and laughs. “Bros, you never even had a chance.”

_X_

Dex finally gets Nursey when he’s sitting in his favorite spot underneath the trees by The Pond, and he relishes it, honestly, a bit too much, for all that he’s actually doing is touching a piece of plastic to Nursey’s chest. However, when Nursey just looks up at Dex and murmurs, “Dude, chill,” Dex loses it a bit and stabs at Nursey a few more times and screams in frustration (some students are walking past and glance at them, but once they recognize the d-men from the hockey team they keep walking, muttering about “for the love of Jack Zimmermann’s ass”). “Stop being so goddamn chill, Nursey! Stop!” Nursey has the gall to look slightly ashamed as he hands over his own knife after Dex stops trying to stab him, and when Dex sees his own name as Nursey’s intended victim, he blushes a little (which manages to turn his entire face from scalp to neckline red). “Oh…” he says quietly.

_X_

Dex almost didn’t realize he was dead until after it happened. He had been contemplating why Nursey hadn’t already killed him (they were always fighting why wouldn’t Nursey want to kill him?) when Lardo had walked past on Lake Quad and shivved him in the gut with a handful of knives she had collected from murdering Ransom. Not knowing quite why, his cheeks flush when he hands Lardo the knives with his and Nursey’s names. Lardo gives his shoulder a knowing squeeze (though knowing what, Dex wants to know) before heading off to (presumably) kill again). Dex sighs, and continues contemplating on things that refuse to make the flush leave his skin long after Lardo is gone.

_X_

Bitty was not prepared for this. He was stress baking. Over a silly frat Haus game. But only he knew who’s name Johnson had given him. And he wasn’t sure that he could do it. But he really wanted that Annie’s gift card. And he justified that he’d really be doing Jack a favor, what with all the coffee he’d bought him throughout the year, if he finally paid for his own for a week or so. But it took Bitty the better part of three days to finally decide to go through with it. “Hey Jack,” he calls out when he sees Jack walking past the kitchen on his way out for his morning run (Bitty has been up since two in the morning going back and forth on this, and is, quite honestly, five hours and a record ten pies later, on the verge of a hysterical fit), “can you come in here and grab the extra tupperware from the tall shelves?” And then while Jack is oh-so-predictably chirping him for his (average!) diminuitive stature, Bitty stabs him with the cheap plastic knife (which he’d never deign to use as actual cutlery because Eric Richard Bittle has ideas about how food should be served). “I’m so sorry, Jack.” Bitty covers his mouth, appalled at himself, but Jack only chuckles. “It’s just a game, Bittle.” Jack hands over his knife and adds, “good luck with Shitty, you’ll need it!”

_X_

Turns out, Bitty didn’t need the luck with Shitty, because Lardo had plans of her own. She stabs him with all of her knives right after Jack finishes handing over his knife, and winks at Jack. She looks warmly at Bitty while he’s still going through this mild post baking breakdown and says, “It’s nothing personal, Bits. I’ll give you the gift card when I win.” Bitty and Jack both blush as she breezes out the kitchen as quickly as she breezed in.

_X_

Shitty does not want to admit to how competitive he is (“That sort of hypermasculinity is just kinda bullshit, brah.”) but if Shitty could just admit it to himself, he might realize that he’s a little bit of a hypocrite (the Haus could have just banned Settlers of Catan, but when the pattern repeated itself with Mousetrap, lovingly renamed Haustrap for all of one sordid evening, game night had to go). But Shitty was good at MurderHaus. You can’t kill a naked man, and if Shitty was good at anything, it was being comfortable in the skin he was born in. However, he was sweating bullets. New rules (passed underneath his door with the knife, for him only apparently) had prevented him from murdering someone while he was naked, and he very well couldn’t just put on clothes and risk getting killed. By the time it was only Jack, Bitty, and Lardo, Shitty had known he only had one trick left in his book, and that meant being naked 100% of the time, rather than the usual 50% (okay, 60%. It was spring, afterall). He didn’t expect that the entire Haus would have it in for him though. So while he was just about to head out the Reading Room to do some work on his thesis, he didn’t even think about what he was doing when Jack threw a towel at him and said, “Hey Shitty, catch!” As he grabbed the towel, he realized his mistake. Ransom and Holster burst out from behind the door leading to the attic and forced the towel out of Shitty’s hand and around his waist, while Bitty led the frogs upstairs to witness the final murder, and Lardo walked out from behind Jack, having hidden in his room for dramatic effect. “Et tu, Lardo?” Shitty cries with all the melodrama he can muster as Lardo walks towards him with a frankly frightening amount of plastic knives. However, his mustache twitches fondly as she stabs him with the cutlery and she, too, can’t hide a fond smile as she pretends to eviscerate him. She then gives him a record 10-second victory belch before pulling out her shutter shades and walking away (just like a cool guy would from an explosion). Shitty’s heart gives a lurch, even as he pretends it has stopped completely (for the drama).

_X_

At the After MurderHaus Kegster, Johnson looks around at the crowd and smiles with satisfaction at the sight of Ransom & Holster making up first with each other, and then Chowder, of Nursey and Dex looking unchill together as they cautiously sip tub juice, of Lardo pulling Shitty into a fond headlock and giving his flow a good rub, and of Jack and Bitty sitting in the kitchen together chirping/flirting without knowing which part is which. John Johnson knows how to recognize a story well told (after all, he helped push it towards the proper conclusion). Knowing that the author intends the end the at this happy point, Johnson takes his leave to go wherever home might be and sleep off the cheerful buzz he knows he only have until the end.


End file.
